Inside Architecture https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik
Notes on Enterprise Architecture, Business Alignment, Interesting Trends, and anything else that interests me this week...Tue, 13 Sep 2016 19:55:29 +0000en-UShourly1Where Is Nick Blogging Now?https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2016/09/13/where-is-nick-blogging-now/
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2016/09/13/where-is-nick-blogging-now/#respondTue, 13 Sep 2016 19:55:29 +0000https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/?p=6385Hello Enterprise Architects! If you are seeing this post, you probably have your RSS feed set to my old blog location on the Microsoft site. I have resumed blogging on my own company site: VanguardEA.com

This will give you access to both my blog articles on Inside Architecture and the articles from my new monthly newsletter, the #archletter

]]>https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2016/09/13/where-is-nick-blogging-now/feed/0Never Waste A Good Crisishttps://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2015/05/16/never-waste-a-good-crisis/
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2015/05/16/never-waste-a-good-crisis/#commentsSat, 16 May 2015 01:30:54 +0000https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2015/05/16/never-waste-a-good-crisis/The title of this post is a bit of advice I first heard many years ago, while working on an Enterprise Architecture review of a troubled software development effort. Never waste a good crisis.

Of course, no crisis is good for the person going through it. Be compassionate. And I’m not talking about a personal crisis like the death of a loved one. I’m talking about a crisis in business, like when a company changes strategy leaving customers out in the cold, or when a new technology simply fails to deliver any value, leaving the champion with less buy-in from his business stakeholders.

These are the little crises of business. It often starts with someone taking a risk that doesn’t produce an hoped-for return. If that someone is a senior leader, and they are smart, they have already collected their bonus or promotion and moved on, so they won’t get the blow-back from their own failure. But just as often, the person who took a risk is still around to get hit with “blame and shame.”

Unhealthy as it is in a corporate environment, blame and shame is common. When something goes wrong, someone takes the fall.

But for an influencer like an Enterprise Architect, a crisis can be a good thing. Why? Because we are change agents. And people won’t change unless they are forced to change. John Kotter, in his book “Leading Change” suggests that one of the greatest obstacles to change is complacency. Change just isn’t urgent enough. He’s completely right, and a crisis is often what is needed to break through complacency.

So a good change agent has a dozen different changes all queued up, ready to go. Well thought out, well planned, well designed changes. Some little, like getting your boss to agree to buy you a new Surface Pro 3, and some big, like a hacker waking up your leadership to the notion data security.

To take advantage of a crisis, you have to be ready. Have your arrows sharpened and sitting in your quiver, ready to go. During a crisis, you may get exactly one shot to propose an idea, and it may not be the moment you expect. There won’t be a “right” time. Just the opportune time. So be prepared.

And when the crisis comes, strike.

On that note, I’m leaving Microsoft.

I’ve had the great pleasure of being part of the Microsoft family for eleven years now. As many of my friends know, I was a dot-com entrepreneur back in the 90’s and had a great run at two start-ups in a row. It was exciting but risky. My children were very small and responsibilities to my family meant that I needed to curtail the risk for a while. So I sought a “safe port in a storm” by joining Microsoft. It served me well. During the doldrum years and all the way into the Great Recession, I rode with Microsoft, pouring my energy into becoming the best Enterprise Architect I could be.

And for the past few years, I’ve been fortunate to be part of Microsoft Consulting, while the company experimented with providing Enterprise Architecture as a consulting program. The ESP program has been through many lives in the past few years, and it is still “figuring itself out”, especially with the new “Devices and Services” world Microsoft has chosen for itself. I’ve met some of the smartest, most amazing architects, project leaders, and yes, even sales professionals while working inside Microsoft Consulting, and I’ve learned a great deal.

But it’s time. The economy is back. Enterprise Architecture is on the rise, and I see opportunities to provide Enterprise Architecture service that are outside of Microsoft’s strategic focus.

So I’m moving on to create my own Enterprise Architecture practice as a compliment to Microsoft Consulting. I am applying to become a Microsoft Partner, and will work happily with Microsoft customers, but I’ll no longer be limited to working solely in the Microsoft model. I’ll be looking for other architects willing to take this journey with me.

Moreover, as many of you know, Enterprise Architecture is of tremendous value in companies that don’t have strong IT strategy and planning DNA. These can be very large companies that are not IT focused, like transportation companies or retailers, or midsized companies that have never really gotten hold of the concept of strategic planning. It can even include start-up firms that need to spend wisely and move quickly. These players are an excellent market for a Vanguard EA, and I’m going for it with an established business and technical architecture process.

I will continue blogging on a new platform as soon as I get things set up. If I’m able, I’ll bring across the EA-specific articles from this blog to that site as well.

It’s been a good run, but I’m awake from my own complacency, and I’m not going to waste a good crisis.

]]>https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2015/05/16/never-waste-a-good-crisis/feed/2Sharing the Solution Domain Taxonomyhttps://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2015/04/23/sharing-the-solution-domain-taxonomy/
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2015/04/23/sharing-the-solution-domain-taxonomy/#commentsThu, 23 Apr 2015 10:17:18 +0000https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2015/04/23/sharing-the-solution-domain-taxonomy/Sometimes, Enterprise Architecture efforts fail. This is no surprise to folks in the EA business. This failure occurred slowly, back in 2007 and 2008. But it did occur. It took me a while to realize it.

I had developed a method useful for Application Portfolio Management as well as for Service Oriented Architecture called “Solution Domains”. The method is good. It’s a framework and taxonomy for high level descriptions of software so that generalized services can be created AND so that the portfolio of applications can be rationalized.

The method is good. But I failed to position it’s use in the appropriate enterprise program in the appropriate way. I failed. Not the method. Where we used the method, it worked brilliantly.

I’ve learned from my mistakes, but being unwilling to let a good thing go to waste, I’m sharing the Solution Domain taxonomy with the world. It’s not patentable (I tried). It is useful, however, because it is a part of a business method that supports Application Portfolio Management in a completely technology agnostic manner as well as Middle-Out SOA.

I may return here, at some point, and provide further details on how it can be effectively used. For now, back to work!

]]>https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2015/04/23/sharing-the-solution-domain-taxonomy/feed/2Alternatives to the EPSC Modelhttps://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2015/02/16/alternatives-to-the-epsc-model/
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2015/02/16/alternatives-to-the-epsc-model/#commentsMon, 16 Feb 2015 13:30:37 +0000https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2015/02/16/alternatives-to-the-epsc-model/The Enterprise Partner Supplier Customer (EPSC) Model sits as a core concept of Enterprise Architecture. It is so much at the core of everything we do that we seldom question it. Is that healthy? This post will discuss the core idea behind the EPSC model (differentiation by control) and alternative ways to think about enterprise boundaries.

First off, we only name things when we want to differentiate them. As the old expression goes, “the fish discovers water last.” In EA, we tend not to discuss the fact that we assume a particular model of enterprise identification and enumeration on a regular basis. That’s because the model is built in to the things we say and do. It’s built in to our business models and our service models. It’s built in to the way enterprises create policies and budgets and govern efforts. It’s so deeply ingrained that we rarely question it. Well, it’s time for this fish to discuss the nature of water. And to do that, we have to name it. I’m naming it the EPSC model, which is an acronym for “"Enterprise Partner Supplier Customer”. It looks like this:

The view that an enterprise is a bounded thing, with suppliers feeding in, customers getting the benefits, and partners in a peer-to-peer relationship… that’s the EPSC model.

The underlying assumption of EPSC is control. In this model, there is typically OWNERSHIP CONTROL over the enterprise. “Ownership control” means the same people OWN an influential number of shares in each of the organizations inside the box. That is not necessarily controlling interest. It is sufficient interest to ensure that the all the businesses inside the box get along well with each other. It works because employees do what their bosses tell them to do. Take that fundamental notion and expand it to the enterprise level and you get the assumption of ownership control.

Another form of control is ECONOMIC CONTROL which is typically the case when there is a huge size disparity between the suppliers and the enterprise itself with respect to the end customers. This happens in retail a great deal. Walmart is a textbook example of “economic control” since their supply chain requirements can drive massive costs into their suppliers without any substantial backlash. The fundamental model above is the same so I’m not going to redraw it. It’s still EPSC. Just with a really big “E”.

Why do we need alternative models?

The Internet has introduced some things we expected, and some things we didn’t. We expected the introduction of easy communication and easy transmission of data. What we didn’t expect: the creation of the commercial ecosystem as a differentiating factor in strategy. In other words, the creation of a product by one company that is combined with another product to be consumed by a customer dependent upon both to solve the needs of a customer that is totally unaware of either one. This is common now in the mobile applications space. A mobile app may be created from unique capabilities of four or more companies that are not just peers, they are collaborating peers, all focused on producing the mobile application. Yet the customer is unaware of the grouping.

The EPSC model is completely broken for understanding this space. It simply fails. Because there is no boss telling you what to do. There are only customer opportunities. It is organic and bottom up in its very nature.

And the moment we examine the “more than one” condition, we have to open the door to the possibility that there are more than two or three or ten. How many alternative models are there? I do not know. No one has enumerated them and drawn distinctions (hey, doctoral candidates… want a dissertation idea? Enumerate these).

I will brainstorm a couple of alternatives. This is not a thoughtful investigation of models. It’s a brainstorm. Take it with a grain of salt. But I encourage you to use the ideas to expand your own thinking.

The Dynamic Collaboration Model

The dynamic collaboration model involves a series of companies that have no common ownership but who collaborate on a very frequent basis to create positive value for customers that is achievable through the combinations of their products.

The key to success in this model is to focus on that dynamic collaboration and to build excellent feedback mechanisms with the customer. This kind of model can fall apart of the customer loses confidence in the collection of companies to meet their needs, and it is vulnerable to attack from alternative collaborative groupings that build better feedback mechanisms.

What other models exist?

My knowledge is not wide enough to suggest that I understand other possible models. Perhaps recognizing more than collaborative self interest is necessary to even perceive them. I know that there are more than one, and I’m guessing that there’s more than two. These are the two that I can see. Please post your own ideas and we can collaborate.

What does this matter?

Well, I’d suggest that the strategy of Microsoft under Bill Gates reflected the dynamic collaboration model, but that the strategy under Steve Ballmer reflects the EPSC model. We can see the gradual deterioration of value and innovation during this period. Microsoft under Satya Nadella has shown signs of moving back towards the dynamic collaboration model. Time will tell. He inherited a very weird beast.

But just as important as understanding Microsoft, what does this say about Google, Amazon, Force.com, IBM, Oracle, and the hundreds of other competitors (and open source initiatives) that fill the technology space?

Oracle seems to play in the EPSC model. What does that say about the future of Oracle?

Amazon clearly plays in the Dynamic collaboration space? Does that ensure a bright future? How important are each initiative in Amazon when viewed in this context? While delivery to the neighborhood is necessary, are the drones needed? Or is that just good buzz?

Google… plays in both. (Kind of like Microsoft). The EPSC model drives their revenue, but there’s a lot of initiatives in the dynamic collaboration space. Is this an intentional transition, or just opportunism?

Facebook is primarily an EPSC business, with a very large base of users. (See economic control above). Will they make moves toward dynamic collaboration? Can they survive if they don’t?

This kind of differentiation is useful for making these kinds of observations.

Your thoughts?

]]>https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2015/02/16/alternatives-to-the-epsc-model/feed/1How brand-thinking can kill you, and capability thinking can save youhttps://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2015/01/29/how-brand-thinking-can-kill-you-and-capability-thinking-can-save-you/
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2015/01/29/how-brand-thinking-can-kill-you-and-capability-thinking-can-save-you/#commentsThu, 29 Jan 2015 19:12:50 +0000https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2015/01/29/how-brand-thinking-can-kill-you-and-capability-thinking-can-save-you/I guess it shouldn’t surprise me that business strategy work is often about constrained thinking. Thinking “inside the box” is nearly always rewarded well. After all, the person giving the rewards lives in the same box. One of the most pernicious kinds of constrained thinking is “brand thinking.” That is the notion that the value of your existing brand is the starting point for all your products. Living within the box of the brand is definitely constrained thinking.

Brand thinking says “everyone knows us for doing this one thing well, so let’s invest in variations on that thing.” That’s great. And it often works. For example, the Dell computer company has a great reputation for building good (but not wildly innovative) personal computers for individuals. So naturally, when they decided to diversify, they decided that they should build on that brand. They decided to build server computers for businesses. It worked fairly well. As they tried to become more innovative, they had problems with the brand. In some areas, Dell simply bought other brands (Alienware for gaming computers, for example).

On the other hand, brand-thinking also leads to a kind of situational blindness. Essentially, we choose not to see the things we think are outside the brand, or even the market, that we are used to. And in doing so, we nearly always miss opportunities. At least, until our competition points them out to us. Dell was good at electronics manufacturing to the home. Had they looked outside their brand, and focused on their abilities, perhaps in the 1990s, they would have been successful competing with Sony or Sharp for personal electronics. Brand thinking says “no.” They stuck to computing, moving into printers, laptops, and tablets. All have suffered from the “commoditization” of their market.

A strategist is a unique role. To be a successful strategist, you have to do everything you can to resist the boundaries of constrained thinking. But then your ideas have to be judged by people who are PAID based on constrained thinking. And that’s a tough sell.

Capability Modeling

When we do business capability modeling, we are looking not at the products of a company, or it’s brand, but at what that company can do. We look at what a company has the people to do, the processes to do, the information to do, and the tools or technologies to do. We bring together this knowledge into a complex model of elements, and summarize it as a capability map.

The value of doing this is typically revealed when creating initiatives for the execution of strategy. If a company is doing incremental strategy, there may be one or two areas that have slowed or prevented the company from achieving its goals with respect to its competition. But when a company is following an innovative strategy, there may be a dozen different capabilities that need attention. Some may have to be created from scratch. Capability modeling is a clearly valuable tool in this arena.

However, there is another use for capability modeling that is not often discussed, and that is the need for unconstrained thinking on the part of the strategist.

Could Capability Modeling have saved Kodak?

If you are over the age of 30, and live in a western country, you’ve probably heard of Eastman Kodak. Known for their near monopoly on film and film processing, Kodak was the undisputed king of photography for decades. In 1990, they held 90% market share. They were unbeatable. Remember this logo? It was a very successful brand.

Let’s assume Kodak had done a capability model back in 1990 and had actually paid attention to it. They would not look at their brand or their existing products, but at the things that they do very well. What would be on that list of “things they do well?”

R&D in chemical-based manufacturing

Manufacturing of plastic and chemical based products

Manufacturing of specially treated paper

Manufacturing of chemical processing equipment

Consumer-focused marketing

Motion-picture-industry marketing

Let’s be clear here. These capabilities were not just solid. They were the best in the world.

What’s not on here? Electronics. Electronics manufacturing. Electronics R&D. Electronics Marketing. Not on the list.

So when Kodak started to see the need to expand, they used brand thinking. People see the brand “Kodak” and think photography. So why not go into the manufacturing of digital cameras?

Do you see anything on that list of capabilities that deals with innovation and manufacturing of digital cameras? Heck, they didn’t make that many analog cameras (Nikon, Olympus, and Canon made most of the analog cameras). They had no distribution network, no reputation, no capabilities, no core skills to make cameras of any kind, and certainly not digital cameras.

Even though they were able to leverage their brand for a while, eventually their ability to sell digital cameras fell away and they lost money. Huge sums. At the same time that their analog film business was also losing money.

Now, look at that list again. What do you see? Ignore the fact that this is a film company. Do you see other things there?

The simplest capability to build is the ability to market to a new segment. The hardest is the ability to do R&D and manufacturing well, so let’s drop the marketing for a moment. Not completely, but let’s focus on the hard stuff. Could they have built products based on treated plastics and treated paper? Almost certainly. There’s an entire industry that makes sheets of plastic film for a wide array of different purposes from glass protection to window tinting. What about chemistry based R&D? Could they have created innovative consumer products to compete with companies like Clorox or Proctor and Gamble? Could they have leveraged their chops in chemistry to compete with companies like 3M? Maybe. But only if they had looked first at their core capabilities.

The important thing to note about these industries is that they have not been disrupted by technology the same way that camera film was. While these industries are not easy to compete in, the ability to leverage existing world-class capabilities is more critical to success than the ability to leverage the brand.

Eastman Kodak thought of themselves in the film and photography business. And it was their downfall. Unfortunately, it still is.

And now a challenge…

What about this brand? What are their core capabilities? And what can they be doing with those capabilities?

Are they on the precipice of disruption? You bet.

]]>https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2015/01/29/how-brand-thinking-can-kill-you-and-capability-thinking-can-save-you/feed/6Moving Towards a Theory of Enterprise Architecturehttps://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2015/01/16/moving-towards-a-theory-of-enterprise-architecture/
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2015/01/16/moving-towards-a-theory-of-enterprise-architecture/#commentsFri, 16 Jan 2015 13:28:41 +0000https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2015/01/16/moving-towards-a-theory-of-enterprise-architecture/I’ve been asked a number of times over the years if I can explain the theory of Enterprise Architecture. I decided recently to reopen that idea. It’s not a new discussion. I refer to Tom Graves post on the Theory of EA from 2012 where he posits that the theory of EA, if one were to be described, cannot be used to prove the value of an EA design. The not-so-subtle hint is that there is, therefore, no value in creating a theory at all. I disagree. I believe that there is value in developing a theory of enterprise architecture.

Let me first recap my gentle readers on what I mean by a “theory of EA.”

Typically, in science, we start with observations. Observations are objectively real. They should be mathematical and measurable. They exist within a natural setting and may vary from one setting to another. We may observe a relationship between those observations. The goal is to explain those observations in a manner that is good enough to predict outcomes. To do this, we suggest a hypothesis, which is simply a guess. We then see if we can prove or disprove the hypothesis using data. If we cannot disprove the hypothesis, we have passed our first test. We use the hypothesis to predict new observations. We then check to see if the predictions are correct. If so, we have a useful theory.

Underlying Observations

Theories are created to explain observations and help predict new ones. So what kinds of observations would I include in the Theory of Enterprise Architecture?

The rate at which companies can adapt to change varies widely from company to company. Let’s call this the “rate of potential change” (RPC) because it refers not to the actual rate of change, but the potential rate of change which will never be less than the actual rate, but may in fact be more.

This rate is important to the survival and health of a company. Companies can die very quickly when their marketplace is “shocked” by a big change in customer expectations or competitive offerings. If the Rate of Potential Change (RPC) is high enough, then any shock to the marketplace can be absorbed by an enterprise by responding competitively. The cost of response appears to increase exponentially as time from the shock increases. For example, from the date Amazon announced their cloud platform to the date that Microsoft produced a product that was as good as the Amazon initial offering, the time that elapsed created a steep obstacle for Microsoft to overcome. The cost of overcoming that obstacle is much higher than if Microsoft had been able to respond sooner. The faster you can respond, the more chance you have of survival. RPC measures how fast you can respond.

The Rate of Potential Change (RPC) appears to be correlated with observable factors like the amount of alignment between strategy and execution, the quality and testability of company strategies, and the measurable maturity of key capabilities for absorbing and coping with change.

These observations need to be measured, collected, and validated. And we need more observations to be researched, shared, and enumerated. We don’t know quite what EA explains just yet, and building out the list of observations gives us a place to start.

The EA Hypothesis

At the highest level, the basic premise of Enterprise Architecture is simple:

The EA Hypothesis: The structure of and both intentional and unintentional relationships among enterprise systems has a direct and measurable influence on the rate of potential change and organizational cost of operating and maintaining those systems.

That simple statement is quite powerful.

The EA hypothesis demands that we create a definition for “enterprise system” and a method for describing the “structure” of an enterprise with respect to those systems and to describe the “relationships” between them. Clearly an enterprise system has to include socio cultural systems, information technology systems, workflow systems, and governance systems.

The EA hypothesis suggests that the relationships between these systems are important. That the relationships themselves influence the rate of potential change. as well as the cost to own a system.

The EA hypothesis demands that we measure the rate of potential change, and that we describe “organizational cost.” To do the latter, we must develop a clear idea of what is involved in operating and maintaining each of the included systems.

The hypothesis is also fairly unbounded. It leaves us with important questions to answer.

Can we cleanly and concisely define what we mean by “system” so that two architects independently examining the same enterprise would develop the same list of systems?

What are the types of relationships among systems and how do we differentiate relationship? What attributes do these relationships have? What attributes make sense?

Does it apply to one system? A subset of systems? or can it only be truly understood to apply to the complete system-of-systems that is, in effect, a complete description of the enterprise?

What standard methods can we develop for identifying ALL of the relevant systems of an enterprise quickly and effectively for the sake of understanding the architecture of the enterprise?

I’m intentionally not answering these questions here because it is rational to leave all of these questions open for scientific research. It is entirely possible that the answers may help us separate useful EA models from useless ones. It is simply too soon to tell.

Why the EA Hypothesis matters

The rationale for creating an EA hypothesis is the requirement, often expressed through strategy, placed on an enterprise by its senior leaders, to do one of two things:

improve the quality and reduce the organizational cost* of performing existing enterprise capabilities, or

creating or expanding capabilities in an enterprise through targeted, specific and managed changes to the network of systems

This matters because nearly all strategy hits one of these two buckets. This goes from corporate strategy all the way down to personal improvement: either you are improving your production, or your production capacity. Either you doing what you know how to do, or you are learning new things. Either you are getting better at the normal stuff, or innovating to add new stuff.

Enterprise architects are called upon to help in both ways. We have to answer questions like: “what does “innovation X” do for us, and what does it do to us?” We also have to contribute to ongoing concerns like “how do I grow my business in “Market Segment Y” in an innovative and compelling way?” and “How do I cut the cost of our IT expenditures?” and “How do I improve the quality of my customer data?” These questions fall under the category of “organizational cost”.

* Cost and quality come together to include a balance of monetary cost, effectiveness, customer satisfaction, efficiency, speed, security, reliability, and many other system quality attributes.

We need a clear theory of Enterprise Architecture because answering these questions is difficult to do well. We have operated without a theory because we were able to “guess and check.” We would guess an the scope and value of an initiative, undertake it, and check on its value later. But we are not able to say, inadvance, that “proposed initiative A” is foolish compared to “proposed initiative B” because we have no science here. It’s all just “guess and check.”

Next steps

First off, we need a long list of valid observations that we are trying to explain and understand. The naturalists of a hundred years ago started with detailed drawings and descriptions of plants and animals and the habitats that they inhabit. Perhaps we should start with detailed drawings and descriptions of the structure of different enterprises and the niches that they operate in. We also need a valid way to measure and observe the “Rate of Potential Change” in an organization.

Secondly, we need simple reusable methods for conducting research in the area. A consistent way to count and categorize systems, for example, and an accepted methodology for measuring their cost and quality that can be applied across different types of systems and companies.

Lastly, we need evidence of the cause and effect of making changes. We need a solidly understood and measured system to be captured in a snapshot, and then a series of changes results in another solidly understood and measured system. That gives us evidence of the value of the changes.

Moving forward from here requires research. More on that connection in another blog entry.

]]>https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2015/01/16/moving-towards-a-theory-of-enterprise-architecture/feed/17Do you perform Information Architecture or a Data Architecture?https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2014/11/21/do-you-perform-information-architecture-or-a-data-architecture/
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2014/11/21/do-you-perform-information-architecture-or-a-data-architecture/#commentsFri, 21 Nov 2014 14:03:00 +0000https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2014/11/21/do-you-perform-information-architecture-or-a-data-architecture/So, full disclosure, I care about Wikipedia. Call me dumb, I know. Wikipedia has been described, alternatively, as the best platform ever invented for fostering useless arguments among ignorant people /and/ the most successful encyclopedia effort of all time. The truth, as always, lies between these extremes.

Well, I’m part of a small team that is working to clean up the Wikipedia pages dealing with Enterprise Architecture. One thing that we noted recently is the fact that there are two pages, similar, both rather poor, that cover essentially the same topic.

We don’t believe that there should be two distinct pages. Wikipedia has a feature called “redirect” that allows the name of one page to point to another. So it’s possible to bring these together. However, the debate is now open… which one? Should the field be called “Information architecture” or “Data architecture”?

(Note, for a while, User Experience Designers used the term Information Architect. That seems to have faded and been replaced with User Experience Designer. I’d love to hear from folks in the UxD business about whether they feel ownership or kinship to the term “information architect”)

Or, third option, we are wrong… and there should be two distinct pages because these are two distinct concepts.

RESULTS

I asked for responses to a quick survey on the questions above. I’d like to share the responses.

There were 55 responses between Nov 21st and Dec 2nd, 2014. The responses broken down to be approximately equal: 1/3rd from North America, 1/3rd from Europe, and 1/3rd from Australia and New Zealand.

In the first question, I asked if there should be one article or two. The answer from the community is: a dead even split.

In the second question, I asked if we were to go with one article, what term should win out. Information Architecture, Data Architecture or It doesn’t matter. As an out, I gave folks the ability to answer this one with: leave two terms.

For the folks who want to combine to one term, Information Architecture beats Data Architecture hands down (34.5% vs 10%).

But half of you (49%) said: No. Leave two terms. They are different!

Analysis and Decisions

With these results, I’m inclined to leave two pages and just work out the distinctions so that there is clarity. That would be in keeping with the career path already laid out by DAMA and would prevent a conflict. The comments provide additional support for this notion and even provide insight into how to divide these two areas up.

Note that I won’t be able to say that the terms are effectively interchangeable. Rather that each one addresses a specific set of concerns for a particular stakeholder community.

The one thing that I cannot answer: can a single individual rotate between two roles: an information architect and a data architect, wearing the appropriate “hat” for their stakeholders, with minimal additional training required? I’m inclined to say “yes”.

]]>https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2014/11/21/do-you-perform-information-architecture-or-a-data-architecture/feed/11The Architecture Manager – the Forgotten Enterprise Architecture Rolehttps://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2014/11/11/the-architecture-manager-the-forgotten-enterprise-architecture-role/
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2014/11/11/the-architecture-manager-the-forgotten-enterprise-architecture-role/#commentsTue, 11 Nov 2014 16:46:03 +0000https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2014/11/11/the-architecture-manager-the-forgotten-enterprise-architecture-role/I’ve met many Architecture Managers over the years. Sometimes they go by the title of “Chief Enterprise Architect” or “Chief IT Architect” and other times, the title is “Vice President of Architecture and Strategy” or some variant. The men and women called to serve in this unique role have a distinct, and uniquely important role to play in the success of the Enterprise Architecture function in their enterprise. Yet precious little is said about them.

In this article, I’ll touch one some of the key qualities I would expect to find in a successful Architecture Manager.

What value does an Architecture Manager provide

As the role of Enterprise Architect matures in organizations around the world, we’ve begun to see the tremendous impact that an effective architecture manager provides. In many ways, the Architecture Manager is the single most important role in the department, but also the most difficult role to fill. That is because, typically, the role is filled by a person who “moves up” from being an Enterprise Architect. Unfortunately, being an excellent EA is poor preparation for this particular role.

An Architecture manager is:

An expert at “selling upwards” – Convincing management of the need, role, measures, and successes of the EA function as a whole.

An expert as “peer selling” – Convincing enterprise peers of the value of requiring their staff to collaborate with an architect, especially when doing so forces a change on the processes they would otherwise use. (this is one of the most difficult and valuable activities an Architecture Manager can do).

A visionary for the development of the function – Convincing the team, the management, and internal partners of the vision and desired impact of Enterprise Architecture in the organization, keeping in mind both short term and long term goals. Without vision, the function cannot grow.

A good people and resource manager – Capable of aligning people to roles that can be successfully performed, helping his or her staff to grow to meet their potential, and finding new resources from within and without the enterprise capable of performing an architecture function. It’s amazing how many architects move up to a manager role and have no idea how to do this well. This blind spot can kill a team within a year.

In my travels, I’ve met both good Architecture Managers and not-so-good Architecture Managers. The ones in need of improvement nearly always struggled at one of the above.

What are the responsibilities of an Architecture Manager

Enterprise Architects are rare birds… especially good ones. There are many folks who have worked to become Enterprise Architects, and a few who succeeded in recognizing the uniquely holistic role of an EA. Typically an EA has to manage through influence alone, because it’s rare that an EA has a team of resources assigned to him or her. But an Architecture Manager is in a different position. They do have a team, and unlike other efforts where they could be objective about a business leader’s business processes and functional alignment, they now have to perform architecture on themselves. Sometimes, they succeed.

If you find you need to hire an architecture manager, you’ll need a list of responsibilities for your hiring team. Just copy the following list.

The responsibilities of an Architecture Manager include:

To set the vision, goals, and measures of success for the Enterprise Architecture function within an enterprise, recognizing the current team maturity, skills of the team members, and readiness of the enterprise to accept the role as desired.

To measure the value of the efforts of the Enterprise Architecture function in a neutral manner and present those measures at appropriate times to stakeholders within the enterprise to earn buy in for the function and the funding it requires.

To create, refine, and oversee execution of the internal processes of the Enterprise Architecture function, including documenting processes, building support for points of interaction, and ensuring the deliverables match the expectations and timing needed by internal partners and stakeholders.

To manage the team members of the Enterprise Architecture function effectively and within the required parameters set by Human Resources. This includes hiring staff, setting team goals, and conducting performance reviews.

To manage the assignment of resources to necessary priorities within the enterprise to meet conflicting strategic needs, and shielding the team members from being pulled out of role.

To act as an evangelist for the role of Enterprise Architect within the enterprise, working to build support for the function and its staff members among internal partners.

What should an Architecture Manager know

Some of this is pretty obvious, but it’s worth stating anyway. The architecture manager has to be familiar with enterprise architecture. But they also have to be familiar with how things can work in an organization, especially if the focus of the EA program is related to IT (as it nearly always is).

Experience with and understanding of the deliverables and value proposition of Enterprise Architecture.

Deep understanding of the methods and processes an appropriate EA framework.

For telecom, this would be Frameworx (formerly NGOSS and eTOM).

For US federal government, that would be the FEA or DODAF. (in different countries, there are different governmental frameworks).

For private business, the leading frameworks would be TOGAF in first, with a tiny number of organizations still using Zachman.

A small but growing number of companies use the Pragmatic EA Framework (PEAF).

Most organizations roll their own, often from TOGAF, so starting there is the safest. Note that a certification in TOGAF or the Zachman Framework is a great start.

Strong written and oral communication skills

Strong and demonstrable systems thinking and strategic thinking skills. The ability to capture the key elements of a system into a simple abstraction that empowers good decisions.

Solid business financial skills. Demonstrable ability to perform cost benefit analysis and manage the budget of a team.

Strong business negotiation skills, influence, conflict resolution, and political savvy

Multiple years of Strategic Planning experience, preferably in a governance role

What should an Architecture Manager NOT do

In many cases, people who move into the role of Architecture Manager worked their way to that role as an architect. They may have been a technical architect, solution architect, business architect, or enterprise architect. In many organizations, these roles are deeply technical. Of all the architecture managers I’ve met, the overwhelming majority are technologists.

Unfortunately, most technologists don’t have the skills to focus on the responsibilities listed above. It is tempting to continue to be a technologist once moving to this role. It is also suicide. Your term as the “Vice President of Strategy and Architecture” will be short if you cannot step back and let your team perform the technologies or modeling activities typical of an architect. This means, for the architecture manager himself or herself: No modeling, No coding, No time spent geeking out. (Ok, exception, fiddling on the side is fine, especially if you want to “stay warm” with your technical skills… but nothing deliverable.)

Where should I look to find a good Architecture Manager

First place is the same as you’d expect for any role: find a person who was successful as an Architecture Manager in another enterprise. Be careful of people who performed but did not succeed as an Architecture Manager. Most folks fail. Find out if the function continued after they left, and if their team enjoyed working for them, and if their stakeholders saw fit to provide an increased level of interaction with their staff members. Look at examples of their teams’ deliverables and ask about their ability to build and maintain new business processes.

Second option is to bring in an experienced architect and let them take on the role. Assuming the team already exists and is well accepted within the organization, this is a reasonable approach. Finding a seasoned architecture manager is extraordinarily difficult, so this may be the only rational option. The person you select should have worked for at least six years as an Enterprise level architect, with increasing levels of responsibility, and should preferably have been a resource manager at some other point in their career. If the program does not already exist, see the next section.

Third option is a seasoned manager who has no experience as an Enterprise Architect. This may be a distinguished technical architect, or the leader of a highly visible program in the past. These folks are expected to bring expert team leadership skills and deep technical skills. The biggest challenge that they will face is being able to adequately learn the role. Unlike most other management roles, the Architecture Manager must be able to SELL the value of the role of Enterprise Architect, and that is extraordinarily difficult to do if the manager wasn’t an architect first. The learning curve is very steep. To pull this off, the Architecture Manager will need a good mentor or an experienced consultant to help guide them through the first year in role.

Building a program around an Architecture Manager

If you don’t already have a functioning Enterprise Architecture program, your very first hire will be the Architecture manager. This role will be doing a great deal of heavy lifting in that first year. Setting up processes and deliverables. Making sure that the stakeholders buy in to collaborating with those processes. Hiring and situating staff. Creating priorities and managing resources. Setting up measurement and demonstrating value. It’s a tough road to build from scratch while providing value.

The only advice I can give:do NOT build a new EA program around an Enterprise Architect who has never been an Architecture Manager before. That is simply too much for a single person to handle. Going from EA to Architecture Manager of a new program is a huge leap, and I have never seen it be a successful approach in the long term. The person you hire may be a “survivor” who knows how to avoid being fired, but that won’t make them effective. Once they move to another role in the enterprise, the function will likely vanish.

You need the Architecture Manager to be effective. To build a program with lasting value. To build a program that matures over time.

So if you are building a new EA program, build it around an experienced Architecture Manager. Then support them with resources that they did not ask for: (a) an outside expert who can provide a neutral point of view and sounding board as they build and struggle that first year, and (b) Serious “air cover” so that they have the time needed to build the team, create the processes, build support, and demonstrate early value.

Conclusion

The single most important person in the Enterprise Architecture function is the Architecture Manager. This critical role is part visionary, part marketer, part people manager, and part evangelist. They have to change the organization and keep the change from undoing itself. The role of Enterprise Architecture is highly dependent upon the skills and the focus of this key role. Choose wisely.

]]>https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2014/11/11/the-architecture-manager-the-forgotten-enterprise-architecture-role/feed/6When does EA start to care about sociocultural influences?https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2014/08/13/when-does-ea-start-to-care-about-sociocultural-influences/
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2014/08/13/when-does-ea-start-to-care-about-sociocultural-influences/#commentsWed, 13 Aug 2014 11:24:38 +0000https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2014/08/13/when-does-ea-start-to-care-about-sociocultural-influences/Organizations do not work, in real life, like they work on paper. On paper, there are departments (all shaped like a neat rectangle) and business processes with neat inflows and outflows of responsibility and information. On paper, you improve things by modeling things on paper, and then moving things around, on paper, then teaching people to follow the process that your neat paper diagrams represent.

In real life, there are human beings and the tools that they use. Sometimes the tools move information from one person to another. Sometimes, they just aid in communication. People meet and get to know other people, and they learn to trust some, and distrust others. Some folks have different measures and motivations and just “pass by” one another. Some subset of these people will have shared cultural values and expectations. There may be many cultures in an organization: both because the organization is in multiple places, and because people from multiple places join an organization. Also, “business culture” arises as leaders achieve successes and people learn to use certain “cultural expectations” to get things done efficiently.

Reality is a lot messier than pretty rectangles.

Enterprise Architects apply science and engineering and aesthetics to the challenge of organizational change. We are unique in that most other “change artists” are not focused on engineering and some even ignore science. (see Daniel Pink’s TED Talk on the Surprising Science of Motivation). Few even know how to spell aesthetics. Yet, when you are dealing with systems that contain and include people, you have to use aesthetics, and you are ill prepared for success if you ignore science. Engineering is a mindset as much as a class of methods. It involves applying the things that science has discovered and using that understanding to build great (and sometimes terrible) things. Engineers build on ideas and use them, often experimenting on systems that are too complex and intertwined for “pure science” to get arms around.

As Enterprise Architecture is such a young science, we have relied to heavily on the “boxes and lines” model of enterprises, and not enough on the messy but important sociocultural view of an enterprise. We find it easier to document, and model, and even simulate, processes as though people were interchangeable and their relationships didn’t matter.

That is just lazy.

It is time to get up off our collective butts and start working out ways to understand sociocultural influences, relationships, and architectures. We have to build ways to detect, measure, and consider these structures when we measure capabilities, or improve processes, or suggest automations, or evaluate business models, or any of the two dozen things that EA’s do.

The value of EA often comes to an executive in the form of a reasoned opinion that is based on data that no one else is looking at. Let’s consider the possibility that examining sociocultural influences can provide interesting opinions that an executive will find valuable.

We should consider sociocultural information if:

Sociocultural influencers can impact the speed of change in an organization.

Sociocultural connections can impact the decision making and governance processes

Sociocultural strengths would allow rapid improvement in business capabilities needed for a shift in strategy

Sociocultural blind spots would prevent an organization from recognizing an existential threat

Think about it. Do you believe that any of those statements are false? I can find ample examples for each one. So if sociocultural interactions matter, why are we not tracking them, learning from them, using them to make decisions?

It’s only hard because we haven’t tried.

(This post inspired by the many similar pleas shared by J.D. Beckingham in social media).

]]>https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2014/08/13/when-does-ea-start-to-care-about-sociocultural-influences/feed/4Call to survey – Is your EA program valuable?https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2014/07/23/call-to-survey-is-your-ea-program-valuable/
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2014/07/23/call-to-survey-is-your-ea-program-valuable/#respondWed, 23 Jul 2014 09:42:59 +0000https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/nickmalik/2014/07/23/call-to-survey-is-your-ea-program-valuable/This is the first time I’ve done this, so I’m hoping that my friends will contribute your opinions: I’ve created a survey asking a few basic questions about how your Enterprise Architecture program is valued, or not valued, by your organization.

Note that this is a free survey tool that doesn’t allow me to collect text responses unless I pay, which I didn’t, so there are no text response fields. If you want to comment on the survey questions or assumptions, please jump over to LinkedIn and comment in this thread:

All comments are anonymous. I will publish the results on this blog. This is just an informal data collection exercise but one that I think may provide a little insight into how you and your peers measure the value of your Enterprise Architecture program.